Another Marauder Wedding
by MeticulousMuse
Summary: Peter Pettigrew recalls the Potters' exciting wedding reception, and reflects on the discovery that a second Marauder is getting married soon... Cautiously rated for some language. JPLE and RLNT, naturally.
It hadn't seemed as though it was ever to happen again.

He couldn't help but remember Sirius' rowdy proclamation that Prongs might've been dragged off the wagon by a certain red-haired, green-eyed, and admittedly fit vixen who wasn't entirely un-boring and, he also had to concede, had a wicked way with a stinging hex, but nevertheless he - Padfoot - would never, ever relinquish the glorious freedom of bachelorhood, even if dragged to the altar by his hair with Voldemort himself officiating, and he urged his yet-unfettered bachelor brethren to vow the same: never another Marauder wedding! Brothers in bachelordom to the end!

He had been rather impressively drunk at the time.

Gid and Benjy had stuffed him under the bar when the curses started flying ten minutes later.

In fairness, they'd asked for it. James and Lily had planned the largest wedding they could put together, with James' bottomless coffers and both of their connections, inviting the entire Order, every Auror in the Ministry, and everyone who could use a day of fun.

Which was to say, every witch and wizard in England whose idea of fun _didn't_ include torture and murder.

They'd done it as a gesture of hope and defiance - to show Voldemort and his minions, and anyone who doubted, that life went on, to thumb their noses at doom and despair, to rub it in the bigots' faces that a wealthy, well-bred pureblood scion, last of his noble line, gladly chose to wed a middle-class Muggle-born witch from Cokeworth - and they had planned its security just as carefully as its seating arrangements and music selection.

He remembered the afternoon Padfoot and Lily had presented to the Order a gratuitously flowery and fancy wedding invitation, embossed in gold and addressed to 'His Prickdom, Lord Moldyvort' and cordially inviting him to kindly topple down the stairs onto his own wandpoint and etc. and humbly requesting his presence at the marriage of James Charlus Potter and Lily Marie Evans - yes, _Evans_ \- which would include a ceremony, reception, and complimentary arse-cursing and conveyance to Azkaban for the wanker(s) of honor.

They hadn't actually sent it. They weren't _that_ careless, even then. But Padfoot's last reservations over his best mate's choice of spouse had evaporated over their gleeful composition of it, upon the completion of which he had pronounced her a right fun bird and almost good enough for the man who had pulled the great Slytherin Chandelier Knickers caper in fourth year.

The trap was sprung that night when two dozen Death Eaters rode in on brooms to crash the reception, neglecting to be wary of the fact that the party in question had been planned by Mr. and Mrs. Prongs, with enthusiastic collaboration from Mssrs. Padfoot, Moony, and Wormtail, and their entire expansive repertoire of dirty tricks. The Order had been ready, except for Sirius, who had insisted the bastards would've attacked by now if they were going to and of course it was safe to get properly soused and really start the party after the clock had hit ten.

As the intruders had breached the perimeter, the dance music had abruptly switched from a waltz to jagged, upbeat Muggle rock-and-roll.

Just to piss 'em off.

The Aurors and Phoenixes currently present had pulled their wands in prompt, well-seasoned unison, alert as guard dogs. The parents of the bride had retreated to a far corner, he with his old service pistol in his white-knuckled fist, and the groom's widowed mother had joined them, wand in one hand and camera in the other. Bystanders readied their wands, kept to the corners, hid under tables; many of them also had brought cameras, for whatever was about to happen next. The bartender, Dorcas Meadowes' Muggle father-in-law, had calmly pulled out the _special_ store of thunderchampagne- which Lily, the Potions expert among them, had insisted was ideal for weaponizing- and begun shaking one in each hand, before passing a sizzling bottle to Arabella Figg. The orchestra, no longer actually playing, had pulled wands from music stands and pockets; the Muggle violinist, half-sister to Caradoc Dearborn, had brought along a rugby bat.

The ceiling imploded- vanishing before it fell two meters but still making quite a racket and kicking up a cloud of dust- and all hell proceeded to break loose.

It was at this point that the bride and groom had run in from another room, clothes in disarray, hand-in-hand and already firing curses, and the Battle of the Potter Wedding Reception had begun.

The disco ball attacked. Dessert forks scooped up food, bent themselves back, and let fly. The serviettes rose from the tables and flapped noisily around the face of anybody not on the guest list, a document that had been charmed to a fare-thee-well by the Mapmakers themselves.

At some point during the battle, a wand arm had swung out from under the bar as the best man bawled out a wedgie hex and nailed the elder Yaxley rather unforgettably. Sirius catapulted into the fray, laughing and shaking his hair from his eyes and cussing out the bad guys and firing jinxes; faced or not, he hit Death Eaters and they stayed down.

Platters and serving dishes impaled themselves upon any curse more dangerous than a stunner, and the contents of the salad bar henceforward demonstrated a rather alarming fondness for the perpetrator. The romantic candlelight went on a kamikaze arsonistic rampage against the Death Eaters' spooky black robes.

And then to top it all, the compression charms on the rather improbable amount of whipped buttercream that just happened to be stored inside the venue's picturesque drapes had let go, and the resulting explosion, which managed to just barely miss each individual named on the guest list, wholly defied description; of their assailants, only Snivellus Snape had been wary enough of his old nemeses' idea of party planning to duck.

The Death Eaters who had attacked the reception that night were routed into humiliating retreat, covered with lettuce, frosting, hex marks, and shame; eight captured for Azkaban and not a single death on either side, was the final verdict. The more fanciful imagined that You-Know-Who had done a spit-take out his nonexistent nose upon hearing of it; the decidedly less so suspected, and not baselessly, that at least two of those who had returned to their lord in such sorry condition had not survived the experience.

It was one of the only clear victories of the First War, and Lily and James had made sure that everyone in the Wizarding world knew about it simply by having invited them all, whether they had been brave enough to show up for the fun or not.

It was the second time the young couple had defied the Dark Lord.

It would be the penultimate time they survived doing so.

When they had died two years later, everyone down to the common wizard in the street still knew the surname Potter, and what it meant that He Who Must Not Be Named had finally gotten to them as well.

And now...

Who would stand with Remus?

Somehow, Peter doubted that he would be invited, even if he was the only other one of their little family who was still breathing.  
Though to say he was 'alive' might be overstating it.

Huddling in shadowy, smelly corners outside the Hog's Head Inn as a rat, spying on old friends who wouldn't hesitate again to kill you as a traitor, watching them audaciously prise happiness from darkness, could do that to a person.

If he'd had the guts to do the same, if he had never sold out, perhaps he would've been dead like James or Sirius, but Remus' fate could have been his as well: still somehow surviving with his principles uncompromised even as the world ended, beating the odds, kneeling and placing a ring on the finger of a deliriously happy witch as her uncanny hair bloomed from lifeless brown to jubilant pink.

It had been a long, long time since he had seen Moony smile so unreservedly.

If Peter hadn't given up- for Remus never would have- neither of them would be the only Marauder left. They would have each other, at least; they would be on the same side.

Peter wouldn't be alone.

He could hardly claim that Remus was so alone, watching her squeal and cover his face with kisses and drag him by the arm to tell all the other doomed heroes their news.

It could all have been so different, maybe. As he crept away he indulged a momentary fantasy, imagining James nearly twice as old as he had ever lived to be, waiting inside the inn to clap Remus on the shoulder, smiling proudly and opining that the soon-to-be Mrs. Moony was a damn lucky bird; Sirius, his face never wasted by Azkaban, guffawing at the phenomenon of quiet, boring Remus ending up with a rambunctious arse-kicking pink-haired pixie as his bride. He even placed an older Lily with them, green eyes shining, arm about the waist of her husband of nineteen years, affectionately mussing Remus' silver-threaded hair and advising his wife-to-be not to put up with a single moment of his self-effacing crap.

He supposed Auror Tonks would be part of the family, too, now.

Peter still wouldn't belong in that picture. He wasn't brave, like James, Sirius, and Lily had been; like Remus and his Nymphadora were. When the ceiling had disappeared that night with an almighty crash, he had taken cover under a table and stayed there, hoping no one would notice, ready to scamper away with his whiskers to the floor.

He transformed to his human shape once out of sight, and Disapparated.

His marriage gift to Remus would be simple, and potentially self-preserving besides.

He would let the Dark Lord hear about it from somebody else.


End file.
